Pedro Almodovar’s 1997 film Live Flesh (Carne Tremula), is rich in both visual and story elements, making in the perfect candidate for a scene analysis. Upon writing this paper, however, this was almost to my disadvantage. I watched it through and whittled it down to about five scenes I considered analyzing. This self-challenge is a testament to not only this film, but Almodovar’s whole body of work; he has created so many thoughtful, intricate, and all together entertaining films in his career, I had to somehow forgive myself for just choosing one short scene out of only one of his movies for analysis. So, without further ado, here is an analysis of a scene from Live Flesh.
The scene I chose to analyze is the one in which David (Javier Bardem) returns home from a basketball game, only to find out his wife, Elena (Francesca Neri) has slept with another man. It occurs at roughly an hour and 17 minutes into the film, and is relatively short, but extremely powerful.
The opening shot to the scene of Elena returning home from her tryst early in the morning. She enters the shower and begins to smell her naked body, seemingly bringing back memories from the previous night. Every time she inhales, she lets out an orgasmic sigh, which makes it clear to the audience exactly what she is recalling. With each sigh it seems that she not only had an amazing sexual experience, but that she also doesn’t regret it at all. This is until her last deep breathe. After this, she pauses for a beat, and in this moment, a look of full realization about the events of the past night washes over her face. This moment is fleeting, however, because right when she turns the shower on, she closes her eyes, as if she is recalling not only the scents of the night before, but even the sights and sounds.
As soon as she stops moving and cracks a smile, the shot quickly changes to David’s cab pulling up. The cab symbolizes David’s dependence, in that all he can do is sit in the back and tell the driver where to go, showing that his disability has forced him to become dependent on so many different people. The fact that David’s cab was shown right as Elena began to smile shows that David’s dependence is preventing Elena from truly being happy, which I’m sure is a struggle in any relationship involving a handicapped person.
The only real way to truly understand a story is to understand all aspects of a story and their meanings. The same goes for movies, as they are all just stories being acted out. In Thomas Foster's book, “How to Read Literature Like a Professor”, Foster explains in detail the numerous ingredients of a story. He discusses almost everything that can be found in any given piece of literature. The devices discussed in Foster's book can be found in most movies as well, including in Quentin Tarantino’s cult classic, “Pulp Fiction”. This movie is a complicated tale that follows numerous characters involved in intertwining stories. Tarantino utilizes many devices to make “Pulp Fiction” into an excellent film. In this essay, I will demonstrate how several literary devices described in Foster's book are put to use in Tarantino’s film, “Pulp Fiction”, including quests, archetypes, food, and violence.
This analysis will explore these cinematic techniques employed by Pontecorvo within a short sequence and examine their effects on our understanding of the issues and themes raised within the film.
"Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" Laura Mulvey asserts the fact that in mainstream films, women are simultaneously looked at and displayed. That is to say, the woman is both an object of desire and a spectacle for the male voyeuristic gaze. The male's function is active; he advances the story and controls the gaze onto the women. Interestingly, the spectator identifies with the male through camera technique and style. In an effort to reproduce the so-called natural conditions of human perception, male point-of-view shots are often used along with deep focus. In addition, camera movements are usually determined by the actions of the male protagonist. Consequently, the gaze is dominated by the active male while the passive female exists to support desire within the film. In an attempt to change this structure, Mulvey stresses the importance of challenging the "look." One way this is accomplished, is in the film Reassemblage, where the look of the camera is free from male perspective and dominated more by passionate detachment. In doing this, the filmmaker, Trinh Minh-Ha attempts to destroy the satisfaction and pleasure derived from images of women in film, by highlighting the ways Hollywood depends on voyeuristic and fetishi...
Run Lola Run, is a German film about a twenty-something woman (Lola) who has 20 minutes to find $100,000 or her love (Manni) will be killed. The search for the money is played through once with a fatal ending and one would think the movie was over but then it is shown again as if it had happened ten seconds later and changed everything. It is then played out one last time. After the first and second sequence, there is a red hued, narrative bridge. There are several purposes of those bridges that affect the movie as a whole. The film Run Lola Run can be analyzed by using the four elements of mise-en scene. Mise-en-scene refers to the aspects of film that overlap with the art of the theater. Mise-en-scene pertains to setting, lighting, costume, and acting style. For the purpose of this paper, I plan on comparing the setting, costume, lighting, and acting style in the first red hued, bridge to that of the robbery scene. Through this analysis, I plan to prove that the purpose of the narrative bridge in the film was not only to provide a segue from the first sequence to the second, but also to show a different side of personality within the main characters.
During the opening six minutes of Nicholas Roeg’s film Don’t Look Now, the viewer experiences a dynamic mixture of film techniques that form the first part of the narrative. Using metaphor and imagery, Roeg constructs a vivid and unique portrayal of his parallel storyline. The opening six minutes help set up a distinct stylistic premise. In contrast to a novel or play, the sequence in Don’t Look Now is only accessible through cinema because it allows the viewer to interact with the medium and follow along with the different camera angles. The cinematography and music also guide the viewer along, and help project the characters’ emotions onto the audience because they change frequently. The film techniques and choppy editing style used in Don’t Look Now convey a sense of control of the director over the audience and put us entirely at his mercy, because we have to experience time and space as he wants us to as opposed to in an entirely serial manner.
have chosen to analyse to answer my title is the scene where he is at
Martin Scorsese has made a reputation from making movies that show a profound perceptiveness of human nature through their images of toughness and violence. On the surface, one would be hard-pressed to find a story more unlike Raging Bull or Goodfellas than The Age of Innocence, which seems better suited to a Merchant-Ivory production. However, Scorsese has placed his indelible stamp on this picture, not only through the camerawork, but in the potent tension that builds between the main characters. For while blood has often been Scorsese's method, the characters, and what exists between and within them, have always been his ends.
Meshes of the Afternoon by Maya Deren is one of the most intriguing and significant experimental films of the 1940’s. Maya Deren is a surrealist experimental filmmaker who explores themes like yearning, obsession, loss and mortality in her films. In Meshes of the Afternoon, Maya Deren is highly influenced by Sigmund Freud’s theory of expressing the realms of the subconscious mind through a dream. Meshes of the Afternoon, is a narration of her own experience with the subconscious mind that draws the viewers to experience the events being played out rather than just merely showing the film. I chose Maya Deren for my research because her intriguing sense gives viewers an enthralling experience by taking them to a different, semi-real world of the subconscious mind. Meshes of the Afternoon not only reveals Deren’s success in a male dominant arena, but also provides a sensational and escalating experience for the spectators.
‘Das Leben der Anderen’ (The Lives of Others) is a striking example of how a director can convey narrative links within a film by employing various styles and film techniques. The Lives of Others relies upon these visual means to assist with the telling of the story as much as it relies upon the script. In this selected sequence of the film, several narrative links are drawn here to form the conclusion of ‘Operation Lazlo’. These narrative links are further cemented by Donnersmarck’s use of various lighting styles, diegtic and non-diegtic sound, revealing camera shots and intricate mise-en-scene.
Veganism is a diet that consists of eating NO animal products. This includes any animal meat, eggs, dairy products, and honey. They are also known to boycott any company associated with animal cruelty and/or animal testing. Veganism is also known as a wholefood, plant based diet. As well as saving the animals, veganism is also a way to tremendously decrease the waste of fresh water and the levels of pollution in our environment. Because of these restrictions, they eat only vegetables, fruits, grains, nuts and seeds, and legumes. The main concern of skeptics, is whether or not this diet has a convincing source of protein. People who follow this diet rave about its benefits, not only in health, but in emotional wellbeing. They say that eating a clean diet like this one, keeps you energized and feeling amazing. Also, studies have shown that people on this diet have significantly lowered their risk for heart attacks, cardiovascular diseases, diabetes, strokes, and cancer. While some people might think that this diet is extreme, there’s a diet that’s even more
... imagination is sometimes more excessive than the action on the screen. After the application of Williams’ “theory” to David Creonenberg’s film Shivers, it is apparent that the spectator’s personal perception of the action (or inaction) is more the cause of the bodily reaction that Williams is referring to, rather than the objective excess on the screen. Ultimately, various characteristics of Williams’ arguments are true, but as a film theory in general, “Film Bodies: Gender, Genre and Excess” needs further research and flexibility in order to be both relative to all “body” genre films, and applicable to all unique spectators.
In The Passion of Joan of Arc, Carl Theodor Dreyer uses the visuality of spatial relationships in each shot with the human face and its ability to convey unspoken emotion in his portrayal of the demise of Joan of Arc. Unlike most film, the message is almost entirely told by just the eyes and expressions of the actors. There is very little reliance upon props and background. The camera angles and close-up shooting accentuate emotions and reactions. The editing style is almost methodic in keeping the emotional pace; it is much like an argument, alternating images of Joan’s tenacity, and the judges’ contempt. The artistic elements of the film are found in the subtle elements of the setting in contrast with the story that is realized by looking into Joan’s eyes as she witnesses her lifelong beliefs condemned and destroyed by her martyrdom.
The major issue that runs through the film that I am going to discuss in this chapter is that there are elements of the gothic, grotesque and me...
Morality has been a subject of many philosophical discussions that has prompted varied responses from different philosophers. One of the most famous approaches to morality is that of Immanuel Kant in his writing Groundwork of Metaphysics of Morals. Kant in this work argues that the reason for doing a particular action or the drive to do good things is a fundamental basis of defining moral quality in a person. To him, an action could be considered morally right only if the motivation behind doing that action was out of ‘goodwill’. When he defines these moral rules, he characterizes them in the form of imperatives – the hypothetical imperative and categorical imperative. While hypothetical imperatives deal with motivations and actions that lead to a particular end, categorical imperatives are a product of rational behavior in human beings. Kant considers such categorical imperatives to be the moral basis for life.
Many, if not the majority, of Americans are obsessed with protein. The general attitude towards protein is that the more one consumes, the healthier and stronger one will be. General concerns for protein intake are highest for those who follow a vegan or plant-based diet, and they are constantly questioned about whether they are getting enough. The answer is yes; vegans do get enough protein in their diet and it is also incredibly easy to do so. Vegans are able to consume just as much protein, and sometimes more, than those who do not follow this specific lifestyle choice. They are able to do so because of their well maintained diet that is adequate in calories, nutritionally balanced and consists of a wide variety of plant-based whole foods.